Poker Hands

Poker hands can be thought of as the game basics just like the blackjack basic strategy or roulette playing tips. It was calculated that there are 311,875,200 ways the cards of 52 card deck can be dealt in five card combinations. But only some distinct combinations (hands) really matter. Here you have the opportunity to study the description of all possible poker hands from the highest to lowest.

Straight Flush

The poker hand which is the sequence of five cards with the same suit. For example: Jack, 10, 9, 8 and 7. As the suits do not matter in most poker games the ties are broken by the highest card in the hand. Straight Flush from Ace to ten is called Royal Flushwhich is the highest hand in poker. Sometimes this card combination is listed as the separate winning hand although in fact it is the form of Straight Flush. There 40 possible Straight Flushes among which are four Royal Flushes. The probability of the Straight Flush to be dealt is approximately 0.0015%.

Four of a Kind

Four of a Kind, also called Quads, is the poker hand which contains four cards of the same value or rank. For example: Jack of spades, 7 of clubs, 7 of hearts, 7 of spades and 7 of diamonds. Usually the ties are broken first by the value of the quad and secondly by the value of the unmatched card. There are 624 possible Four of a Kind hands and the probability of one to be dealt is 0.024%.

Full House

This poker hand, also called the Full Boat, contains three cards of one rank and two cards of another rank, no matter the suit. For example, 6 of clubs, 6 of spades, 6 of hearts, Queen of heart and Queen of Diamonds. In case of ties the rank of three matching cards is compared firstly and then the rank of pair is verified. There are 3,744 possible Full Houses and the probability of this poker hand to be dealt is approximately 0.14%.

Flush

Flush is the poker hand which consists of any five cards all of the same suit, for example: Jack, 7, 6, 4, 2 all of spades. The ties are broken by the highest card or the next highest card. Again, the suit doesn’t matter. There 5,148 possible Flushes among which are 40 Straight Flushes. The probability of Flush to be dealt is 0.2%.

Straight

This poker hand is the sequence of five cards of different suit, as for example, 9 of clubs, 8 of spades, 7 of clubs, 6 of hearts, and 5 of diamonds. The ties are also broken by the highest possible card. Ace in Straights can be used both as the highest and lowest card. There are 10,240 possible Straight hands and the probability of one to be dealt is about 0.39%.

Three of a Kind

This poker hand is also called Tripsand it contains three cards of the same rank and two unmatched cards no matter the suit. For example: King of diamonds, King of clubs, King of spades, 5 of hearts and 4 of spades. In case of the ties the winning hand is firstly determined by the rank of three cards and then by the highest of two unmatched cards. There 54,912 possible Three of a Kind hands and the probability of one to be dealt is 2.15.

Two Pair

Two Pair contains two cards of one rank, two cards of another rank plus one unmatched card. For example: 10 of diamonds, 10 of clubs, 7 of spades, 7 of hearts and 4 of hearts. The ties are broken firstly by the rank of the pairs and then by the rank of the unmatched card. There are 123,552 Two Pair hands and the probability of one to be dealt is 4.75%.

One Pair

This is the poker hand which contains two cards of the same rank, for example, 5 of clubs, 5 of diamonds, 10 of hearts, Jack of spades and Queen of clubs. There are 1,098,240 One Pair hands and the probability of one to occur is about 42.26%.

High Card

High Card, also called No-pair, is the lowest poker hand consisting of all the cards of different rank and suit. The value of this hand is determined by the highest card which also breaks the ties. The lowest High Card hand is considered to be seven high (7, 5, 4, 3, 2 of different suit) which in some online casinos poker variations with the objective to obtain the lowest hand is the best wining one. There are 1,302,540 possible High Card hands (with no pairs, flushes or straights).